As some of you know I’m planning on doing a big-time tour in May along the East Coast. I’ll be dropping some Qs onto the forum every now and then as issues arise.
What I’m trying to figure out right now is how to ship my bike to my start point. It doesn’t make much sense for me to buy an actual bike cargo case because I’ll be biking home, and not flying back with it. I’m guessing there are one time bike containers I can get somewhere, but I have no clue where to go/ask etc…
Take it to a shop, ask them to box it for you. They’ll prob. charge you a bit, but they’ll just put it in a bike box and you can assemble it at your destination. Alternately, ask them for a bike box and pack it yourself.
Insure and Track your bike! I can’t say this enough because even if stamp it fragile, some people really just don’t care whats in the box and will break it (speaking from experience, as I have placed a claim with Canada Post a day ago for damaging a pair of zipp 404’s sold to a U.S. customer).
I think you might not be shipping it by mail or anything though this rule applies for pretty much everything. As for where to get a box you can either get one at a local bike shop and if you cant find one there talk to the people over at the grey hound terminus near beri I know they often have extra box’s laying around. You can buy them new from them as well.
If it’s sent by train you don’t even have to remove the wheels or anything, Via rail box’s only require you to change the handle bar angle and that’s all.
Be careful about nasty surcharges some airlines nail you pretty hard if you’re flying. Try to find a shop that has just gotten their 2010 bikes in and they will be happy to part with as many boxes as you need.
boxes don’t have the crush resistance so you want to shore up the insides with rags or thick cardboard tubes. The best stuff I’ve found to protect the bits of the frame is foam piping insulation you can get at any old hardware store.
When vacationing in Seattle I wrapped my bike, training wheels, and race wheels in a box with a thick comforter I bought at a thrift shop for about $5. I used 2 boxes, one box I cut up to add support and seperate the wheels and frame. Then I wrapped everything with the comforter. While on the plane waiting to take off I saw the crew below loading the luggage and the guy seriously tossed my bike carelessly onto one of the trolleys desite the “FRAGILE” written all over the box. The bike still arrived unscathed though
It cost me $50 to fly my bike to Russia and Aeroflot didn’t charge me a penny to bring it home. Lufthansa apparently doesn’t even require you to box apparently, just offset your bars and they rack the bike in the hold - 50$ flat rate too and they are apparently very good about paying for damages.
There are plenty of horror stories about shipping stuff via airlines and I have never once flown without something happening. Usually a combination of getting bumped off of flights and luggage lost.
if you are flying w/ the bike, the BEST way to avoid the fees is to put a bunch of wheel chair stickers on your bike bag/box. Since putting those stickers on, nobody has asked me whats in the box, and therefore no need to lie to avoid the fees.
and what’s been said about Lufthansa is ONLY true for flying w/in Europe. Airlines have different standards that they have to follow for NA and Europe, and one big difference is that they can’t charge you for a bike when flying w/in Europe.
